----- Original Message -----
From: ...

Originally from: "Coleen Taylor" <...>
To: <...>
Sent: Friday, February 20, 2004 9:51 AM
Subject: Re: [farmtalking] willy-nilly

Hi Francis

Whether one likes it or not; haphazardly.
The original sense of this odd word appears at the beginning of the
seventeenth century, when people used it to suggest that something must be
done no matter whether one is willing or unwilling, whether one wants to

or

not. It's a modified form of an older phrase that is variously expressed

as

will I, nill I or will ye, nill ye, or sometimes as nilling willing.
Will here is used in its sense of wanting to do something, to wish or

desire

that something should happen (when you make your will, you are using the
same sense: you are expressing your wishes for the distribution of your
goods after you die). Nill is very old, known before the Norman Conquest,
but has long since vanished from the language. It was the opposite of

will,

so to nill is to want not to do something, to refuse or reject some course
of action.
So will I, nill I can be expanded into "be I willing, be I unwilling",
combining the two sentiments with the implication that it doesn't much
matter what you feel. More recently, this conflict gave rise to an
implication that a person was not sure whether to do something, and so
suggested he was undecided or indecisive. Even more recently, the

associated

sense has grown up of embarking on some project without direction or
planning or in a disorganised way.
There is an equivalent Latin phrase nolens volens, formed from two Latin
participles that mean "unwilling, willing". It is sometimes said that
willy-nilly is actually a translation of the Latin phrase. It may have

been

an influence, but it's hard to tell.

Coleen

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